US PREMIERE After fleeing his native North Korea to defect to the south, the artist Sun Mu works under a defiant alias meaning “no boundaries” to criticize the repressive regime of Kim Jong-un. A former propaganda artist, he subverts familiar images which once glorified the Supreme Leader, transforming them into satirical political pop art. Offered […]
US PREMIERE Academy Award winner Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy (Saving Face) teams with filmmaker Geeta Gandbhir to follow a group of Bangladeshi women police officers on a UN peacekeeping mission to Haiti. We come to feel the emotional toll of a risky and grueling year abroad. Muslim women are often kept at a distance in the Western […]
Jon Alpert (DCTV) and Sheila Nevins (HBO Documentary Films) present the world premiere of a new documentary short, followed by a keynote conversation and reception co-presented by HBO Documentary Films. In Alpert’s new film, Mariela Castro’s March: Cuba’s LGBT Revolution, Cuban Congresswoman Mariela Castro – daughter of Raúl and niece of Fidel Castro – confronts decades of cultural and institutional homophobia to serve as a tireless champion of […]
NYC PREMIERE This timely look at US-Cuba relations focuses on the younger Cubans and Cuban Americans who are seeking to bridge the conflicts of their parents’ generation. Covering a span of ten years, the film looks at the buildup to and aftermath of the 2009 Peace Without Borders concert in Havana that assembled some of […]
City life. A union man on a mission uses a giant inflatable rat to raise awareness in Lenny and the Rat (USA, 8 min., Jason Hutt). S – The Musical Shuttle (USA, 40 min., Alina Abouelenin, Benjamin Bergmann) shows why the S train is the most lucrative for NYC’s buskers. Mac Premo – stuffmaker (USA, […]
Experiences in the melting pot. Satellite Baby (USA, 9 min., Jenny Schweitzer) uncovers the consequences of a Chinese immigrant daycare alternative. A Resident Alien (USA/Spain, 18 min., Naiara Eizaguirre-Paulos) evaded Honduran drug cartels but may be forced back home. The Absentees (UAE, 10 min, Tanya Daud) are stuck in a no-man’s land. A Romanian Olympian […]
2014 SHORT DOCUMENTARY WINNER In August 2010, Stephen Kim, a brilliant State Department intelligence analyst, was indicted under the Espionage Act for jeopardizing national security by allegedly divulging classified information to a reporter; The Surrender intimately documents Stephen Kim’s struggle to understand the events leading up to his prosecution as well as his last free […]
WORLD PREMIERE Lenny and the Rat captures a day in the life of union organizer Lenny Anselmo and the 20-foot inflatable rat he places at non-union construction sites around New York City
US PREMIERE Now a yoga teacher in the US, Ella Cojocaru, a former Olympian gymnast, recalls her defection from Bucharest on the eve of the Romanian revolution.
WORLD PREMIERE A Lost Boy of Sudan works three jobs in a tireless effort to achieve the American Dream and return home.